Tungdil pushed back the lump in his throat and blinked.

"An orc! Afterward they said it was a tragedy and a terrible accident and he swears he can't remember a thing, but I couldn't care less: My sister died because of him. I don't know if you could forgive him, but I don't intend to."

Tungdil knew there was nothing he could say. The story was unspeakably sad. He laid a hand on Bavragor's arm. "I'm sorry I put you through it again," he said simply.

Listening to the mason had brought back the pain of losing Lot-Ionan and Frala, who had been like a sister to him. I can almost understand how he feels.

"So now you know," sighed Bavragor, taking a deep breath and flushing away the memories with a long draft of brandy. His ham sandwich lay untouched and forgotten by the fire.

Tungdil looked up and glanced at Boпndil, who was guarding the camp from his lookout on the fallen pillar and puffing on his pipe. Blue smoke rings wafted into the darkness, rising through the falling flakes, and Tungdil thought for a moment that he could hear the hiss of hot tobacco on snow.

"The fieriness of his inner furnace is a curse," Boлndal said sadly. "He still can't remember what happened on the bridge. All he knows is that Smeralda was lying dead at his feet and he thought the orcs had killed her. When Bavragor and the others told him that she'd died by his axes…"

"Weren't you with him?"

"I wish I had been. I keep telling myself that if I hadn't been injured, I might have stopped him before it was too late." He scratched at a rusty patch on his chain mail and oiled the corroded links. "He calls out to her in his sleep sometimes. Trust me, scholar, he suffers just as much as Bavragor, but he'd never admit it."

Boлndal filled his pipe and they took turns smoking, each pursuing his thoughts. Tungdil looked out of the crumbling window and saw that the snow was falling faster than before.

A pair of snowmen appeared in the doorway: Furgas and Rodario were back from fishing. The prop master had caught two fully grown carp, but the impresario was clutching a single, insubstantial tench.

"A god among plowmen, but a terrible fisherman," commented Bavragor, hoping that a bit of banter would dispel his gloomy thoughts.

Rodario didn't rise to the taunt. "What's the use of being a god when the mortals forsake you?" He pointed to the crumbling, damp-ridden frescoes. "Deities need lesser beings to adore them, or they fade and die. They lose their purpose; there's no reason for them to exist."

"Vraccas doesn't need a purpose," Boлndal told him firmly. "He created himself because it suited him, not because of anyone else."

"I'm familiar with the creation myths, thank you, and I certainly don't need any sermons from you." The impresario turned his attention to filleting his fish. "We used to perform them on stage-very successfully, I might tell you. It's true what they say: Old stories are always the best, although in the present circumstances our play about Nфd'onn seems to strike a chord."

That was Tungdil's cue to ask him about the theatrical effects he had witnessed in the Curiosum. Ever since the performance he had been longing to find out how they made the illusions seem so real.

"You're interested in how we did it?" Rodario pointed his scaly knife at Furgas. "Ask the expert."

While the impresario continued to hack away at the unfortunate tench, Furgas finished gutting the first carp and started on the second. "I know a fair bit about alchemy. That's how we make the smoke, for example. Thick smoke, wispy smoke, red smoke, black smoke, whatever we need. The science of the elements is fascinating."

Alchemy was one of the subjects taught by Lot-Ionan at the school and Tungdil was familiar with some of the chemicals, having fetched and carried them often enough. "But how did you extinguish all the lamps at once?"

"Magic," Rodario whispered, trying to look enigmatic. "You thought Nфd'onn was the only magus left in Girdlegard, didn't you?" He leaned over to Tungdil, fiddled with his ear, and pulled out a gold coin. "What do you say to that?"

"Thank you," said Tungdil, snatching up the coin. He tested it with his teeth and knew at once that he'd been had. "Gold-plated lead," he reported. "And not even good-quality gold." He tossed back the coin. "Your magic's not up to much."

"He's a conjurer, not a magus," laughed Boлndal, pointing at the impresario with the stem of his pipe.

Rodario wagged a finger at him. "But the audience falls for it, and that's what counts. Why, even the ugly little bцgnilim were tricked by my art, and that, my friends, is what's known as success."

"So it's all a case of conjuring, illusion, and alchemy," said Tungdil, summing up.

Furgas nodded. "And makeup," he added, glancing at his slender mistress. "Makeup convinces the eye of what it otherwise only suspects. It turns Narmora into an дlf and sends the youngsters screaming to their parents." He laughed. "That's when we know that we're doing something right."

"Just be thankful it was Tungdil and not our lunatic ax man who visited your theater," Bavragor said darkly. "He would have stormed the stage."

"Poor Narmora," Boлndal murmured unthinkingly. "Even without makeup she looks remarkably like an elf. Nature can be cruel sometimes."

The comment prompted smiles from Furgas and Rodario, but Narmora shot the startled secondling a murderous look. Tungdil and Bavragor fell about laughing, thereby waking Goпmgar, who peered nervously over his shield.

"Oh," said Boлndal, embarrassed. "That came out all wrong. I didn't mean it that way," he apologized.

"Are you sure I look like an elf, not an дlf?" Narmora said threateningly. Her eyes, so dark they were almost black, glowered at him angrily. "I hope none of you get a nasty shock tonight…" She stood up, straightened her head scarf, and left the ruined temple. Her silhouette melted into the darkness.

"Ye gods, she's a natural," Rodario gushed. "Doesn't she play the role to perfection? Of course, I've no intention of telling her. She'd only demand a raise." He looked excitedly at the others for confirmation, and the dwarves concurred with mute nods. Boлndal was genuinely perturbed about what might befall him when he fell asleep that night.

The men finished filleting their catch and soon there was a smell of roasted fish. They all tucked in hungrily.

"There's one thing I don't understand," Tungdil said to Furgas. "How did you make the set? Everything-the woods, the palace… It looked so real."

"Can you keep a secret?"

"Of course!"

"Do I have your word?"

"Absolutely!"

"Swear by the blade of your ax."

Tungdil swore himself to absolute secrecy.

"Magic," announced Furgas with a mischievous grin. He smoothed his mustache.

"Uh-huh," sighed Tungdil, kicking himself for falling for the routine.

Boлndal sat up with a jolt and stifled a scream. For all the shock of being woken, he was glad to have escaped the visions that had plagued his sleep.

His relief was short-lived. On reaching for his crow's beak, he was alarmed to discover that the weapon was gone. Slender fingers encircled his wrist.

He rolled over to find himself staring into the cruel, lean face of an дlf. Clad in full armor, she was crouched beside him, studying him with cold, dark eyes. I'm still dreaming, he told himself frantically. It can't be…

"Let that be a lesson to you," he heard her hiss menacingly, just as his eyelids grew impossibly heavy and he drifted off to sleep.

When he woke for the second time, he leaped up, spluttering and gasping, and whirled round to face the threat. This time his crow's beak was in its proper place and he snatched it up hastily.

The players were asleep: Narmora in Furgas's arms, and Rodario, head resting in a pile of discarded fish skin, nestled beside the dying fire.